2018: The Under Over Arch Team is out

And just like that, another year has passed us by. 2018 has been a year of changes here at Underground Overground.

It’s with a very heavy heart we’ve said a few goodbyes to some tremendously talented archaeologists; Chelsea, Shana, Matt, Jessie, Teri and Maria. All of which have left a very big hole in the UOA family. We have however had a new addition with Michael joining the team along with Clara and Jamie becoming permanent full-timers following the completion of their Masters at Otago (Congrats – you guys rock!). Let’s take a look at some of our highlights from the year. We got to work in some pretty cool places…

Costa del Timaru. Image: Megan Hickey.

Tikao Bay. We get paid to go to these places, it’s a pretty sweet deal I know! Image: Megan Hickey.

When the Christchurch office met the Dunedin office. The two joined forces for our dig at Redcliff. Image: Tristan Wadsworth.

Just when you think these locations can’t get any better, we met some furry friends that really were the icing on the cake. And if you missed Hamish’s We Dig Cats blog now’s the purr-fect time to give it a read (sorry, that was claw-ful).

Did you get my good side? Image: Hamish Williams.

RIP Muncho (pictured here on a 19th century salt-glazed sewer pipe.. We also sadly lost another team member this year, the best archaeology cat you could wish for; Muncho. Image: Hamish Williams.

But on a slightly more positive note, Monty the sausage dog joined the team. Image: Clara Watson.

Cool features

Of course, we found some cool features…

Perhaps the best road reserve find of the year – a 1880s stone pedestrian crossing on Norwich Quay, Lyttelton. Find out more about this fine feature, and road formation archaeology here. Image: Hamish Williams.

People from the past

We also came across some interesting people from the past.

This year we celebrated the 125th anniversary of women’s suffrage, which saw New Zealand become the first self-governing country in the world in which all women had the right to vote in parliamentary elections (check out our blog post A tea cup as a symbol of political change from September to read our tribute to those amazing women who helped make it all happen). Not only did women get the right to vote, but women were also eligible to sit on many councils and boards (although women were not eligible to become members of Parliament until 1919!).

Mrs Elizabeth Yates became the first Mayor of the Onehunga District in Auckland in December 1893, just three months after women had been given the right to vote (Star 20/11/1893: 3, Press 1/12/1893: 5). Unfortunately this was an exception and not the rule, and Canterbury’s local governing bodies continued to be populated by men throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth century.

During our research of Canterbury’s past we often come across some interesting insights into those men who made up these governing bodies. For example, the Superintendents of Canterbury. When the New Zealand Constitution Act was passed in Government in June 1852, the Province of Canterbury was officially formed and a Provincial Council was elected to govern it. At the head of the Council was the position of Superintendent. During the tenure of the provincial system Canterbury had four Superintendents; James Edward Fitzgerald (1853-1857), William Sefton Moorhouse (1857-1863), Samuel Bealey (1863-1868), and William Rolleston (1868-1876).

...and not unlike the government today, their opinions sometimes conflicted.

These four gentlemen held different opinions on the best way to govern and what ought to be prioritised, and not unlike the government today, their opinions sometimes conflicted. In 1869 Alfred Charles Barker, a prominent Christchurch photographer, took two photos of two of the Superintendents of Canterbury, Rolleston and Fitzgerald, which highlighted and made fun of this fact. The first photo, entitled “The Argument”, shows the two superintendents apparently having a heated discussion (Figure 1), while the second photo, entitled “Result of the Argument”, shows them apparently resolving their differences with a (mock) fist fight (Figure 2).

Photograph entitled “Result of the Argument” showing Superintendents James Fitzgerald (Left) and William Rolleston (Right) having a mock fight. Image: Barker, 1869

Unfortunately, not all of the disagreements between Canterbury’s official elite were so jovially represented. In 1900, a disagreement between Sumner’s Mayor William Rollitt and Councillor Charles Hulbert, resulted in a heated argument which was recorded in the local newspapers the following day. The two men exchanged impassioned words before members began to storm out of the session without a quorum being met (Figure 3). We can only hope if women had been present their behaviour would have been more considered!

And of course, we couldn’t talk about 2018 and artefacts without doing a wee shout out to the Convention Centre. One of our largest sites to date, but also one of the coolest with some amazing artefacts found!

Some of the many many cool artefacts recovered from the Convention Centre.

Epilogue

From everyone here at Underground Overground Archaeology, we wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. The blog will be back at the end of January.

Underground Overground Archaeology

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